A STATE apology to victims of institutional abuse may be made by a designated executive minister amid the continued crisis at Stormont.
Victims had called for urgent clarity after First Minister Paul Givan's resignation meant that he and former Deputy First Minister Michelle O'Neill cannot deliver a long-awaited public apology to victims on behalf of the executive on March 11.
It is more than five years since a report by the Historical Institutional Abuse inquiry, chaired by the late Sir Anthony Hart, exposed serious sexual, physical and emotional abuse over decades at children's homes run by religious orders, charities and the state.
The report recommended a state apology.
DUP leader Sir Jeffrey Donaldson said another executive minister could make the apology.
"We have...discussed with the other parties the designation of a minister in the executive to deliver that apology to the victims," he told BBC's Good Morning Ulster yesterday.
A spokeswoman for The Executive Office said the Hart report recommended that the executive and institutions found guilty of systemic failings should make the apology.
“The department will continue to engage with victims and survivors; and we will work with the Commissioner, and Victims and Survivors Service, to ensure victims and survivors are supported in the time ahead," she said.
Fiona Ryan, Commissioner for Victims and Survivors of Institutional Childhood Abuse, said she has written to the Executive Office and the head of the civil service "to ask what options are being considered to deliver the apology".
"With the apology hanging as it is in the balance, what has happened is already causing significant anxiety to victims and survivors," she said.
